Open Book with Anthony Scaramucci - Trump 2.0: Reckoning & Revenge with Miles Taylor

Episode Date: August 2, 2023

Anthony talks with former Homeland Security official and Anonymous whistleblower, Miles Taylor, about his new book Blowback: A Warning to Save Democracy from the Next Trump which sounds the alarm on the possibility of a second Trump term. The two get personal on their own experiences in the White House and standing against Trump, revealing the various characters and struggles they faced. Miles explains why Trump really could beat Biden in 2024, stressing just how dangerous Trump 2.0 would be…  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with Eye Gaming Ontario. Hello, I'm Anthony Scaramucci and this is open. book where I talk with some of the brightest minds out there about everything surrounding the written word from authors and historians to figures and entertainment, neuroscientists, political activists, and of course, Wall Street. Sorry, I can't resist. Before we get into today's episode, if you haven't already, please hit follow or subscribe, wherever you get your podcast, and leave us a review. We all love a review, even the bad ones. I want to hear the parts you're enjoying or how we can do

better. You know, I can roll with the punches, so let me know. Anyways, let's get to it. Trumpism, that's something I hope we had seen the back of, but we now know that's far from the truth. Miles Taylor's new book, Blowback, predicts what a second Trump president is he could look like. It reads like a thriller. But the scary thing is, if we don't fight back and learn from what Miles is telling us, it could become a reality. With 2024, just around the corner, we need to learn from the past, and I urge you to listen to everything in this conversation. So joining us now on Open Book is someone that I consider a friend and a patriot and a best-selling author. He's the former chief of staff or the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

He's a national security expert. He's written a couple of books. His recent book is called Blowback, A Warning to Save Democracy from the next Trump. Miles became very famous when he wasn't famous, of course, because he had written the New York Times article under the title of Anonymous, and then he wrote a book, Anonymous, which was describing to the American people from inside the Trump administration, the danger of Donald Trump. And so obviously, you know, you and I have shared that commonality. We wanted to go work for the government and help our government, serve the American people and saw things that were out of control that we both felt compelled to talk about. So obviously, you know, I admire you a great deal, Miles. This new book, a warning to save

democracy of the next Trump is phenomenal. And I'm going to tell you what, Anonymous was great, but I love the fact that your name is on this book and I love the fact that you are very candid about everything, including you yourself, which I heartily recommend to people, particularly young people, to read this book because it is a real basic guidebook on what to do and how to do it and how to serve your country in a patriotic way. So thank you for writing it. It takes guts to do the things that you've done. Take us back to 2018, your anonymous New York Times article. And I've heard you say in other interviews that you sort of feel like you contributed negatively by making it anonymous in terms of people's trust in government. Explain that to us, Miles. Explain to us where you were

in 2018, the thought process there and where you are today in 2023, your thought process. Anthony, it's a great question. And I'm not going to let you interview me that way without first addressing you and how awesome you have been throughout. this process. I promise I'll answer your first question. But in the spirit of being real, real and just candid and not going on shows and doing talking points, you and I had a phone conversation after the election in 2020 when I was still living in this safe house that I talk about in the book, the place I basically had to escape to as things just got worse and worse. And honestly, I did not know what I was going to do next in my life because my life had blown up and I will never forget.

It was nighttime. I was sitting on the balcony of this high rise, this totally nondescript, boring, ass, horrible safe house in northern Virginia. And the Wi-Fi signal was best on the balcony. And I had my laptop positioned in the dark. And we talked from sunset until it was dark. And I think just the laptop screen was the only thing lighten up my face. And I was asking you what you thought I should do next and you were really blunt with me and you said, just keep telling the truth. And boy, did that stick with me. Because writing this book, no bullshit, was really hard to do. It was hard to every day be thinking about how grim a second Trump term could be, but I felt an obligation to try to paint that picture very lucidly and not hyperbolicly, but also hard to relive

some of the really traumatic pieces. So I actually don't know, Anthony, if in saying that I should tell you that I hate you or that I love you for encouraging me to do that. But I think it's the latter. And so I just, I really want to thank you. I sometimes have self-loathing. I get it because you're saying stuff and you're like, you know, there's a weird thing going on in our society now. People are punished for honesty and they're praised for conjecture and talking points. You know, Like if you were a community, if you were the CEO of a publicly traded company, and I was your successful communications director, not the failed one that I was in the White House, but if I was a successful one, I'd be telling you to say nothing. Go on the air. Here's your homogenized talking points. Walk off the air so that people feel you didn't say anything. Don't be offensive to anybody. Okay, but you're out there and you're explaining to people that the country is under threat. the country is under threat, not just from Donald Trump, but from a cabal of people that want to end the democracy. They don't like the rules anymore. Either the demographics change and it became

less of a white country. And so we don't want the brown and black people to be in power. So let's change the rules. Or we don't like certain parts of our culture. Or we don't like certain people that have different sexual orientations than ourselves or who knows, even some of that's maybe closeted fear-based stuff that goes on. I don't know what it is, but we reward people for not telling the truth, and we hit people like you with a shotgun blast for telling the truth, Miles. So why is that, you think? First of all, do you agree with that assessment or that I'm off the mark? Completely. And we'll give you an answer, and I'll start with an anecdote. There's a lot of fear today about being on the wrong side of your listeners or your viewers. And that doesn't just apply.

to a TV show host or a podcaster. I mean, like everyday Americans, your listeners or your viewers or your friends and your family and there's people around you or the people watching your Snapchats or TikToks, folks are just really terrified of getting canceled and pushed out of their tribe, whatever their tribe is. And it changes their behavior. And I'll give you an example. And I won't say who this is because I do highly respect the person.

But I was on a cable news show in the past couple of days. And, you know, someone who's got a left-leaning show who I think felt that they, you know, even though they had me on, I'm still a former Republican. And, you know, I served in the Trump administration. So there's still got to be a zinger in there. And they came after me on Trump's reprehensible family separation policy and said, you know, you were at the Department of Homeland Security when this happened. Do you want to apologize to the families? And I'll tell you, Anthony, that fucking sucked because the true story is I was one of the few people in the federal government trying to stop that policy. And in fact, I was the guy who co-wrote the executive order

that we put in front of Trump to tell Jeff Sessions to go pound sand and that it was over. But a lie gets halfway around the world before the truth can put its pants on. In fact, the truth is probably still just totally asleep in the digital age as the lie lapsed the planet. And I give you this example, not because anyone needs sympathy for me, obviously you and I going into the Trump administration, you know, people were going to say, well, therefore, the fact that you were there means you must own these policies and refuse the intellectual exercise of actually digging deeper and asking, you know, what actually did you do when that thing happened? But I think people posture because there is a fear that if they don't do what their tribe is expecting,

that they themselves will get attacked. And it leads to, I think, intellectual dishonesty, but more than anything, it leads people to really misrepresent their views. So let me be more specific about this. In the book and blowback, I talk about how there have been recent surveys that show that everyday Americans, the moderate majority, is now self-centric, that people misrepresent their views in public and have very different views in private, especially on politics. What's scary to me is the cohort that doesn't do that are the political extremes, especially on the far right. People on the far right will tell you in public what they say in private. And so if we've got the majority that are moderate just shutting themselves up, then it really

is definitionally the extremes driving the debate. And you pair that with studies that show that I think it's something like 75% of the conversation on Twitter was being driven by the 8% most ideological voters and social media users. The stats plus or minus a few percentage points, but Jonathan Haidt cites that in one of his books. And it literally shows that the extreme elements are the ones driving the conversation and it makes it harder and harder for people to speak out. I think the only way you counter that is frankly, you just refuse to shut up. I mean, so for instance, I could have curled up in this hotel room bed yesterday that is still kind of messy after that shitty cable news hit. But again, I respect the anchor. It was a good person. I think they were trying to get

to a good question. But if I just let bad moments like that shut me up, well, then the other side, guys went because then I'm not out there talking about the dangers of a second Trump administration. So I guess that's to say in this environment, you've got to kind of take the crap a little bit because it makes it that much easier for the next person to come forward and less scary for them to speak out. I agree. There's going to be a however, though, there is a group of people no matter what you say or how honest you are. There's just a group of people because you work for Donald Trump. They're just going to negate you. That's part of their virtue signal. They have to, uh, You work for Trump. You're definitely bad, even though you were a force for good inside the administration, even though you were attempting to protect the American people. General Kelly is a personal friend of mine and a personal friend of yours. We both know why our friend, General Kelly, left, which I'd like to go into if you don't mind. But also, take our listeners behind closed doors with Donald Trump and why he's not the representative of the GOP. But yet you have these

jellyfish that could have put them right through the ropes after January 6th, but rather than do that, they flew down to Mara Lago to do photo ops with them. What is it about his personality that scares these people? And tell us a little about General Kelly, your experience with Pompeo or a Kevin McCarthy. Yeah. Well, and I'll answer that by explaining actually why I went into the administration. And hopefully this merges your first question with the second question. And that is, I was really opposed to Trump early in 2015 and 2016 when he emerged onto the presidential scene. He just didn't seem like a conservative to me, didn't seem like a Republican, and I didn't want to see him be president. And in the last days of the election, I sort of frantically tried to get members of Congress that I was working with in the House of Representatives. I was a staffer at the time. I tried to get them to rescind their endorsements. And I started to see inklings of the answer to your question and the responses I got is members of Congress sort of blew me off or made jokes. And none of the of the ones I tried to get to rescind their endorsements did, even though after the Access Hollywood tape, it seemed like there was abundant reason to distance themselves from the guy. And I couldn't

figure it out. I thought, you know, at a minimum, it's going to be politically beneficial for these people to say they stood on the right side of history when Donald Trump inevitably loses. But even if he had lost, I don't think those people would have regretted not rescinding their endorsements. Why? Because they didn't want to break from the tribe. And rescinding their endorsement from Trump would have made it look like they weren't a team player in the Republican party. And they would have been chided for that. And these guys value their tribal affiliation more than anything in their lives. I mean, I sincerely think in some cases they care more about their tribal affiliation with the GOP than they do the livelihoods or the welfare of their families.

And I say that because when John Kelly came onto the scene, I saw a very different attitude. And he got nominated by Trump to be Secretary of Homeland Security. I'd loosely known him in his time at U.S. Southern Command because he'd come up and testified on Capitol Hill. We'd engaged with him. And I had immense respect for him. And in those early conversations with Kelly and his transition team, it was clear he was going into the administration with a very different perspective, not trying to suck up to Donald Trump and endorse him, but frankly, from a position of grave concern about whether this man was capable of being commander in chief. And at that point, I'd actually been offered several jobs in the White House. And, you know, that would have been a

dream to, you know, I think back to 10-year-old Miles Taylor, he would have said, what the hell are you thinking? You're not going to take a job in the White House? This is your dream. But I knew it would be career suicide to be that close to that guy. And it was obvious to everyone. He was a pretty bad man. And so I didn't take the job in the White House. But when I spoke to Kelly, I thought, okay, this is a guy who legitimately wants to come in and keep the wheels on the wagon. And maybe there's a shot to do that if I'm working for him and not working for the big guy. And so I did say yes to that and went in and joined him. And like you, maintain immense respect for John Kelly. You know, I rarely go through social media comments because people are such jackasses. But, you know,

occasionally I do. And I don't know, not too long ago, I posted something John Kelly said. And, you know, there were people out there. How can you like General Kelly and he enabled this guy? I'm going to tell folks right now. I don't care. What's your opinion? is, I know the man. He's one of the most moral people I've ever met in Washington, and he threw his whole body and his career on a grenade. And troll comments like that actually justify what I just said, because he knew he would be villainized by people who would never understand why he stayed in that administration. But I sincerely think we could have gotten into a nuclear war when Donald Trump was president. That was a non-zero possibility, and people like Kelly being around prevented that. Now, at the end of the day, I'll be very self-critical. I think we were deluded in

thinking we could keep him in check. And we ended up failing at the end of the day because he just simply replaced the people who tried to keep him in check. And I was highly responsible for spreading that fantasy that unelected bureaucrats could protect us from Trump. I'm guilty as charged of that. But till my dying day, I will say people don't know the full extent of what John Kelly did to protect this country. And I just admire it immensely. Yeah. And listen, he fired me. Okay, that was like his first the visual act was to fire me, okay? And I, you know, I was a little sore out of in the beginning. We were both a little sore, but I think once we got each other's vibe, we became very close friends. And I think that that's the important thing. If you're committed and you're a patriot,

and what I would say about you and John Kelly, you guys are Patriots first, partisan second, or maybe even Partisans Deep Last, but your Patriots, you know, through the whole alphabet, if you will, down to the letter Z. Well, can I say, can I interject, Anthony, to, to throw that right back at you, but I'll say to listeners, just so they don't think I'm blowing smoke up your ass, that, you know, my opinions of you were influenced by the chief, you know, at first. And I remember the day that we swore him in in the Oval Office and you were in there and Kelly Ann and Jared and others. And I'm pretty sure that the, in fact, this is, this is how I remember. You tell me if you remember it differently. We went into the Roosevelt room to celebrate after Trump swore him in, which was sort of funny because it was more I described

it in the book like a funeral wake and not a celebration because we were so upset at DHS to lose him. And we also knew it was going to be, you know, he was not looking forward to being the chief staff to the president, to put it lightly. But he didn't come into the Roosevelt room. And I was like, well, where the hell is he? And I'm pretty sure one of the first things he did was after he walked out of the Oval, you and him, you know, had a poll aside conversation where I think it was discussed that you would be leaving. And, you know, when that became public that you'd left the administration, I thought, ah, you know, here he is, cleaning house of these Trumpers that are in there. And since that time, you know this, I've come to have just the most, the highest opinion of you

possible. You're just an exceptional patriot, a family man. You're so generous, incredibly, even to your critics. It's amazing. I've learned so much from you. But that's because there was a willingness to, you know, open the door back up and have conversations, which people don't do anymore. They don't reengage someone that they had a character.

of. And I think you were the one to reach out to me several years ago. And I was just floored by it. So anyway, that was all a way of saying that I fired you immensely. It's nice to say. I mean, you know, you see, you are a nice person. That's not actually what happened. He called me into his office and said, you're fired. And he said, I'm cleaning house. And I need my own comms director. You're not going to be it. And he gave me my marching papers. Okay. I got up and I shook his hand. I said, I totally respect that. You're the chief. He then admitted to me, which was I have to tell you, I have a lot of respect for,

he said the minute that Trump said that I was reporting directly to him, there's no way that you can have the comms director report directly to the president and not through the chief of staff. And he said, even though you're willing to do that, that wouldn't work. You would just the idea that that was in the memo. And, you know, listen, obviously the thing I said about Bannon, which, you know, know, I think it's one of the best things I've ever said in my life. Actually, I have no problem with it.

You know, we don't have to go over. This is a, not an R-rated podcast, but I think, I think it was literally one of the more legendary comments. And by the way, as General Kelly now admits to me, you know, I was right. You know, Bannon was one of the more malevolent Cretans in our society. And so the thing I would say about Bannon Miles is that he understands and can articulate Trump's worldview because he's a student of history. But what I also say to my atheist friends out there, if you don't believe in God, you should. And let me provide evidence why there is a God.

Because Bannon is smart. He's charismatic. He's well read. He has a malevolent worldview that Trump shares. But God made Steve so ugly. Okay. He's made him so ugly that we don't take him seriously, thank God, right? You know, he looks like, you know, he's got the rosacea of an alcohol. And he dresses in contemporary hobo. Okay, thank God. You know, so you have to thank God. I think it's hobo chic. You know, hobo chic.

You have to thank God for that. But go to these guys in your book. Go to McCarthy, Pompeo. Go to the Republicans in the book. What has you torqued up or not torqued up about those guys? It's not personal for me anymore. It was for a period. There was a period of time where I felt deeply, personally let down by these people.

again, the McCarthy's and the Pompeos who I witnessed in private express very candidly their views of the former president. They're very negative views of the former president. The things that we all know to be true. I mean, I don't even need to catalog what they thought because they just thought what we all thought. He's an observably stupid unhinged person. And anyone who can't see that is clearly trying to get something and has some kind of

agenda. I mean, genuinely, I've yet to meet the person that's in our political system. in the Republican Party who really authentically admires Donald Trump. I don't know who that is. And there is no actual mega maga. There's just mega climbers and the people who, you know, keep their opinions to themselves and hope they won't draw his eye. And so it was a lot of personal disappointment in folks like that that I looked up to.

And now it's just I feel like I've got to find the people who are willing to be flipped because they are so, so valuable. I do think that, I'll give you an example. Another person who I didn't used to be friends with and now I just think the world of, Stephanie Grishol. You know, Stephanie made my life a living hell when she was press secretary

and coming out against me when I was criticizing the president and all that stuff. She went after me too. Yeah. But you know what? When she turned on Trump, I thought, this is such a gift because she's such a credible messenger.

She was in the mind. MAGA movement. She was at least a true believer in the populism. She may not have been a true believer that Donald Trump was a man of character. And now she's really seen the ugly underbelly of it and she can go message to those communities. And I think people like Stephanie helped folks break away from the tribe and are useful messengers. So that's where my focus is now, is trying to find those Republicans who I know have an opinion in private that they might be willing to express in public and try to lower that cost for them. Some of those people you mentioned, I don't think Kevin McCarthy, I don't think it'll ever happen, sadly.

Yeah. I, you know, I saw some inklings of it with Pompeo recently. And it's sad to me because I personally had just, I got to tell you, I mean, at one point, I told Mike Pompeo that I thought he should be president of the United States before Donald Trump was elected. I mean, yeah, he's a gifted guy. I was like, you are like the Tony Soprano of politics, but with a moral code. I just freaking loved Pompeo.

And, you know, he was a sophomore congressman and I was a junior. staffer and I was just like, you are the guy. Like, let's get you there and wanted to help him angle into good chairmanship and future in the party. But then to watch him as Secretary of State know these same things that I knew and be in a more important position, a vastly more important position than me and have a microphone and not then use that to tell people the truth about the danger in the Oval Office. That was a deeply disappointing thing.

And I continue to be disappointed, but I'm not taking it so personally anymore. I'm more focused on, okay, who can we get to actually speak the truth and how do we make it easier for them to speak the truth? And we agree, and I like Mike a lot, but he falls into the category of many of them. So what do you think of this current crop of presidential candidates and the 2024 primary season? And if you don't mind, make a prediction force. It actually is mixed because I am starting to see more criticism of Trump than I expected. I had a pretty grim view going in. I didn't think there would be any candidates outside of, you know, people who don't have a shot that would be criticizing Trump.

But Chris Christie may not have a shot, but we've seen the Christie's, thankfully, just go full bore against Trump. And Christy, like a lot of us, is not undeserving of criticism. I mean, he really, really lent legitimacy to Donald Trump from the get-go and all the way through. But you know what? It's never too late to do the right thing. And I firmly believe in redemption. And by God, you know, day by day, Christy is slowly redeeming himself in my eyes by going out there and being really blunt about Trump. And I actually will say it's more courageous than folks realize because Christy's going in front of these audiences that are really conservative.

You know, he's going and standing in front of these folks that really, really love Trump. And he's telling them that Donald Trump is a psychopath. path. And that takes some guts. But we need more people doing that. So look, if I had to make a prediction about the field and I'm going to paint a pessimistic picture right now, I think Donald Trump, despite another indictment that is imminent, will be the GOP nominee. I think he will be the GOP nominee. I don't think anything's going to change with Biden being on the ticket. You're going to have probably the most restless electorate you've ever seen in recent history. And that's saying something, given what we went through in 2016 and 2020. And then the no labels team is going to

to come out and offer a unity ticket that is really going to muck it up in unforeseeable ways. And potentially, if they don't do that right, and if they're not very cautious, could give Donald Trump a fast pass back into the Oval Office while there are cases proceeding against him. And then we are in constitutionally uncharted territory because there's not a person on this earth that doesn't think that Donald Trump wouldn't pardon himself if he became president. And that, of course, would be challenged by the courts. but we don't know what would happen there. And I've asked the best constitutional scholars about that. And essentially, their answer is a big question mark. And the fact that there isn't a clear resolution to that does mean constitutional crisis by definition.

So we're not too many hops away from a possible massive constitutional crisis, but I will still hold out a little hope that one of these candidates opposed to him, Tim Scott or Chris Christie, will break out and be able to suppress Donald Trump's numbers in the primary states, enough that the field can coalesce around them. instead of him. This season, Instacart has your back to school. As in, they've got your back to school lunch favorites like snack packs and fresh fruit. And they've got your back to school supplies, like backpacks, binders, and pencils. And they've got your back when your kid casually tells you they have a huge school project due tomorrow. Let's face it, we were all that kid. So first call your parents to say, I'm sorry. And then download the Instacart app to get delivery in as fast as 30 minutes all school year long. Get a $0 delivery fee for your first three orders while supplies last. Minimum $10 per order. Additional terms apply. It's incredibly well phrased and you are unfortunately likely to be

right. So he is going to go through these trials and tribulations. He is the nominee. Do you think he can win it? Yeah. I mean, I hate to say it. I think today if it was just Trump versus Biden, I think Donald Trump wins. And certainly that's the last. thing that I want to see. I mean, I just wrote a whole damn book trying to paint a picture of how bad a second term would be to convince people not to make that mistake. But I think that Democrats are highly unmotivated about Joe Biden and they can get mad at me, but the numbers show it that a majority of Biden's voters are really, really unmotivated about his candidacy. I think at the highest levels we've ever seen for an incumbent. And a lot of the Republicans who defected from the GOP to

support Biden, which just helped put him over the edge, the polls show a lot of them have gone back to the tribe. So Biden can't count on as many independents as he had before or as many conservatives as he had before come in coalition with him. And that really cuts in Trump's favor. And it's remarkable to think after everything that Trump has that possibility. But I think there's a real chance. And the betting markets don't totally agree with me. The betting markets still give Biden an edge right now, but not as much of an edge as you'd want. I mean, the other day I looked and I think the odds makers gave Joe Biden a 38% chance of being the next president and Donald Trump a 32% chance. I mean, that's almost a coin flip. I think you're right that they bring in a third party miles. It'll hurt Biden more than

Trump, don't you think? Yeah. And look, Anthony, you know this about me. I'm a real believer, actually, in third parties and competition in our democracy. I really hope in this century, and maybe it won't be until I'm retirement age, that we'll see a competitive multi-party democracy where there are many factions and there are more moderate parties and the Democrats are still there and the Republicans. And we have more choice and competition. That will require a lot of democracy reform. But in this moment, a third party ticket, all else being equal, looks like it could spoil the election for Donald Trump and put him back in the White House, which is a very scary prospect to me. So I hope people who are considering that are at least thinking about talking to the White House first and seeing if there's a way to do some kind of negotiation before they enter into the fray.

All right. Let's go to the personal side for a second. You know, we both experience some personal struggles coming out of the Trump. I mean, I almost got, Giorgio and I almost got divorced. Thankfully, we were able to patch it up. It impacted my business. You know, again, you don't get rewarded for telling you the truth. People like Trump, they'll fire me.

people that hated the fact that I was with Trump in the first place, they'll fire me. You know, this is the way it works. But, you know, we both had some struggle. Tell us a little about your struggles. You've had to hire bodyguards. You've moved locations. Give us a sense for the personal toll honesty has. Well, you have experienced this as much or more than me, Anthony, and I'm glad that you've flagged

what you've gone through because, you know, sometimes people will villainize you or I and say there's this magic word that's called grifters. And they'll say, you're grifters. And I always find it, I understand the inclination for people to do that because when they see on television, they assume that being on television means you're just making a ton of money and you must be raking it in. And I really wish some of those people that level the accusation had been sitting there with me in a dingy apartment filing for unemployment in the months after I left the

Trump administration. And I'm not embarrassed to say it. I think some people are embarrassed to say when they've been on welfare. I mean, you know, when I was younger, we had some tough times as a family and after the Trump administration. You know, I did. I laid out for people, not for sympathy, but for clarity that, yeah, I lost my home and I lost my job and I lost the relationship that I was in and my personal security and I had to blow my savings on lawyers and, and protective measures. Everything was detonated. And any one of those things is enough to push someone into a pretty dark place. And I had them

all happen at once. And unsurprisingly, it did. It put me into a pretty dark place. And I developed an addiction to alcohol to cope with it and pills. And I did all of the things that you think are like bad movie tropes that I never would have imagined would happen. But I just needed to turn off reality because my reality became so barren after coming out against Trump because our political environment, the political intimidation and violence and discourse is so overwhelming, it just enveloped my life. And it wasn't just from the right. I mean, it was mostly from the far right. But in total candor, some of the people who individually were cruelest to me were people who had said they really wanted people to break out of Trump's orbit and oppose him. And then when some

of us did, they savaged us and said, why didn't you do it sooner? the hell were you? Why did you go in? I mean, they kind of lumped everyone into a MAGA camp together. Right. And no one bothered to ask, did you even vote for Donald Trump? You know, I didn't vote even for Donald Trump. But, you know, you get lumped into that camp. And some of those people, and I don't need to name them, but really made life exceptionally difficult. So longer answer than you asked for, but staying in politics is the least financially beneficial decision I've ever made in my life. It's so detrimental. I appreciate the answer so much because it's so honest. And, you know, And obviously I share and have empathy for you because a lot of it has happened to me.

I guess my thing that I tell people philosophically, you don't go into the NFL, put the helmet on, wear the jersey, and expect not to get a concussion. Okay, because, you know, you're on the battlefield. You're going to get hurt. That's you and me. Okay, so I love your book. You got a new podcast. It's called The Whistleblowers inside the Trump administration. Tell us about your new podcast.

Yeah, I'm excited about this. And again, lest anyone be confused on the grifter label, neither of these projects has paid me very much money. In fact, neither is sufficient enough to pay the bills. So, you know, I have a day job working on a nonprofit think tank stuff in Washington, D.C. But I was really flattered to get asked to do this pod is IHeart Radio wanted to do a series about people who spoke out inside of government. And they asked if I'd be willing to host it. And the honest story, as I said, you know, I don't want to just read the prompts. I don't just want to be a radio voice.

I want to help you go find these people and tell the stories. And so we went and spoke to a whole bunch of folks all across the Trump administration, people that were lifelong Republicans, to people who were just apolitical public servants who somewhere in those years blew the whistle, either about presidential misconduct or wrongdoing inside of an agency. And it was fascinating to me. It was fascinating to me because not only were these stories. harrowing and gripping and emotional. But Anthony, I asked every one of these whistleblowers we

spoke to at the end that whether they regretted it, after detonating their lives, did they regret it? And not a single person told me they did. Now, they may have said they would have done some things differently, but they all said they still would have blown the whistle. And it's hard to find things these days that are inspiring and uplifting. And that gave me a much needed boost. And back to your earlier point, no one has to have sympathy for me. Like you, I went into the political arena wide-eyed. I knew I would take punches. And life's been good since then. I found and married the love of my life. I'm 18-month sober. But the thing that I would say is we need to really protect those people in our society who don't expect that they're going to enter that gladiator

arena. And we've got a lot of brave public servants around the country all the way to the local level, you know, people who stood up against the electoral coup, who never expected to be in the fray like that and took some really brutal punches. And that would just be my one exhortation to your listeners is when you see those people getting attacked and experiencing the crowdsourced intimidation come to their defense because they need it and they didn't sign up for this. All right. So I'm down to the part of the podcast where I read out my five words.

After I read somebody's book, I think about some of these things put it together. I need you to respond to these five words. And then you, you know, you can put a paragraph, a word, whatever you think. Okay. So word number one, Biden. I'm thinking about this one. At risk of losing. Democracy.

At risk of losing. Trump. I wish I gave the same answer. At risk of winning, right? No. Biggest loser. Fundamental threat to democracy, as we know it. Yeah.

But also a symbol of something gone wrong in the country because he is an avatar. He represents a very large group of people. He really does. And I don't have anything against those people. I've got extended family members who are MAGA voters and friends who are so frustrated with Washington. But I think they're being duped. I know they're being duped by a guy who says he's going to be their retribution. And all he's actually saying is elect me so I can go get retribution for myself. Yeah, exactly. His message is, I only care about myself. Maga, the concept MAGA. Populism. 24. A year of reckoning. I think that next year will be the most important year for our democracy of any since I've been alive. I'm approaching the back half of my 30s and we've been through some times of turmoil. Anthony, you know, you were there in New York on 9-11. We all witnessed those years together after the fact. That felt like it was going to be the watershed moment for democracy is how we

responded to that. We saw what happened with Trump's rise. We saw as presidency. I think all of it will pale in comparison to the moment of decision we have next year, which if it is Trump versus Biden, is the most black and white choice we've ever had in the modern history of the republic about whether to keep democracy alive or whether to roll it up and throw it away. I think that's really what next year will come down to if we continue on this path. So well said, the title of your book is blowback, a warning to save democracy from the next Trump. It's got everything that you would expect to have in a book about our current political zeit guest. Your personal observations and your personal stories are amazing. And your descriptions of the people are great. So I enjoyed the book a great deal.

And I really appreciate you coming on Open Book. Well, and I appreciate you talking to me for it. I think some of the punchiest quotes in the entire tone are Anthony Scaramucci quotes. So, You were very gracious to give me your time and insight about why we're in this place we're in. So, Anthony, thank you. Well, I appreciate you including me, but it was fun to do those interviews with you. Well, I'm grateful for you, brother. And, yeah, thanks for what you continue to do. Miles Taylor is, to me, one of the more interesting people that I met during my time with the Trump administration and in my time in the transition.

He actually sent me a text the day after I was announced as one of the executive chairman, on the transition team. Very thoughtful guy, got staffed into the Homeland Security Department. Obviously, General Kelly did a great job there. Secretary Nilsen did a great job there. But Miles saw something that, frankly, all of us were afraid to discuss out in the open. He decided to write this op-ed in The New York Times called Anonymous, just letting people know how dangerous he thought Mr. Trump was. He admits in blowback that that perhaps wasn't the best way of going about it. But still, he got the word out there. He denounced him in 2020, which is something I greatly respect because I had to do the same thing. And of course, that comes with death threats,

that comes with people taking pictures of your house and telling anything to break through the door and all kinds of nonsense. And, but here he is. He's still at it. He's like a woodpecker, just banging, banging, banging, on the Trump effigy, the Trump potential dictatorship and the Trump potential autocracy. And so I admire him. him enormously. We find ourselves with a 50-50 chance for Mr. Trump to win the presidency if he wins the Republican nomination. So I just want to say that again, he gets the nomination. The country's so split, it's 50-50 becomes president again. And we're going to be making sure that that doesn't happen, of course, and we're speaking very honestly, very openly about these situations. But it's a

fraud time for America because you have a 78-year-old and an 80-year-old running for president. And that's the time when these guys should be playing golf, not seeking the presidency. But we'll see. I'll be out there swinging away alongside of Miles. Hope you enjoyed our conversation. Ma, you're ready to come on the podcast? So I interviewed this week a guy by the name of Miles Taylor. Okay, he worked actually for General Kelly when John Kelly was the Secretary of the Homeland Security.

Okay. And you know, General Kelly and I, we like each other a great deal. he has written a book about the danger of Donald Trump and his fear of Donald Trump regaining the White House, and he thinks it would be a disaster. So what do you think, Mike? A disaster not to be believed. First of all, he speaks out of his real end. He has no, he's very narcissistic.

He doesn't look at the person that is not 100%, because he has someone in his family that's not 100%. And he doesn't look at that person with the regalness that made me that person can get help. The right sympathy, right. He tries to ignore. And that's how he would leave the country. I don't think he would be good. Absolutely not. Yeah.

But I think he would be good. All right. Stop with me for a second, though. Go on Trump for a second, okay? Why do you think he would be so bad for the country, though? I forget about my opinion of him. Just on your street smart observation. He's not a straight shooter.

I think that he's a crook. Let's say it's the way it is. He's a crook. Right, yeah. And when you were in the White House, he could have saved you in the White House, but he was threatened by your way of talking and how good you were. And that's why he got rid of you. And General Kelly was another one that was good, but he got muffled with him a little bit.

Right. Yeah, well, General Kelly, I mean, he was probably age 10 years in the 18 months because Trump was driving him crazy, you know, and he was also trying to prevent Trump from doing crazy. enough and can outdo him, he gets very threatened because he really doesn't have it. Right. Right. Yeah. All right. So you think he's going to win again, Ma? What do you think? Well, it's a terrible. I was raised a little bit snobbish. And I do think that the people that, you know, he promises the people that they're going to have stuff. And the people that are on the poor side will maybe vote for him because he gives him a pack of law that they're going to, they're going to live better.

I don't think they will. I really don't. All right. All right. So you don't think he's going to win again or you think he is? This is how I feel about Trump, okay? I think that the other countries, look at Trump. He has a good presence as far as his own structure and his height and the way he's roofless

and the way he speaks. But people that are intelligent know that he's full of it, okay? Right. That's how I feel. I think Santos, whatever the hell is, makes mistakes in his way of talking. If he could get himself more educated on it, maybe he'd have a chance. And I think Christy, I can't see him as president.

I think he's a very nice person, but I don't think he has the husband. Well, let's see what happens. All right. I appreciate you joining me on Open Book, Ma. I love you. I love you, baby. All right, all right. All right.

Hi. I am Anthony Scaramucci, and that was open book. Thank you for listening. If you like what you hear, tell your friends and make sure you hit follow or subscribe wherever you listen to your podcast. While you're there, please leave us a rating or review. If you want to connect with me or chat more about the discussions, it's at Scaramucci on Twitter or Instagram. You can also text me at Plus 1, 917, 909-29-996. I'd love to hear from you. I'll see you back here next week.